The weather cooperated yesterday for the Mayhem Festival. Around 90F, but the humidity was low so it was tolerable.

Big turn out, looked about 90% sold out there had to have been close to 15k at the mainstage. Saw the Metal Mulisha do their stunts in the late afternoon, first time I’ve seen Freestyle MX in person, it’s really wild stuff.

Heard the end of Hatebreeds set and right after they were done the stage started to get taken down. Missed FFDP but saw all of Lamb of God. Quite a few Lamb fans, they put on a tight show, they had the pit in the lawn going strong for their short 7 song set.

Next was Rob Zombie as the sun was setting. He’s a great show man, lots of interaction with the crowd. He had a wild set, a lot of pyro, a cool screen set up and dancing robots! He’s got some catchy songs and with John 5 on guitar (he did a crazy solo) and Joey Jordison on drums, he sounded great.

Then it was Korn’s turn! They hit the stage at 10 on the dot and wasted no time getting into it. Lights flashing behind the red curtain, they start into Right Now and…the curtain completely malfunctions! It’s slow to come down and the last 2 or 3 rungs didn’t release so the stage was completely blocked for a few seconds ruining Korn’s entrance (personally I don’t think Right Now works well as an opener either). They took it in stride though and just pummeled the venue for just over an hour.

Set list was the same as the last few Mayhem stops, Oildale and Let The Guilt Go from the new record (really hoping for Pop A Pill). Shoots and Ladders probably got the biggest reaction, people went nuts for it. Somebody Someone was an epic showing with Ray showing off his skills and then Munky playing his part back into the song with his guitar flat on the ground like a slide guitar. The jam with Fieldy and Ray that leads into Freak on A Leash was nuts as it always is.. It was a really heavy night for Korn, very little downtime with mostly the new intros and medleys into songs. No talking from JD until the very end of the show. Korn was really feeling it, they’re playing really well together and they’re all really animated on stage (don’t think I’ve seen Fieldy smile that much before) and they sounded fantastic. Ray is just a monster behind the drum kit and has given Korn a new breath of life. Fantastic energy from the band and the crowd, even after almost 8 hours of music!

JD could have been a little louder though and I noticed that Right Now was played a little slower than normal. Right Now really doesn’t work well as an opener, Here To Stay is much better and I have no idea why they don’t open with Oildale like they did on the first date, it’s an amazing track live. Great show all in all, just a bummer that the set was so short. I’m hoping for their next US tour they go for a 2 hour set list and stray off the path of singles (as this show was all singles).